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“Bread’s just out of the oven and you can have all you want.” She had halted by Debera’s chair and her hands, shapely with long strong fingers, patted Debera’s shoulders lightly as if imparting a special message to her along with that pressure.

“You lack something, come tell me, or mention it to T’dam. You weyrlings shouldn’t worry about anything other than caring for your dragonets. That’s hard work enough, I’m telling you, so don’t be shy, now.” She gave Debera a little extra pat before she removed her hands.

“I didn’t think to bring with me the gown you lent me last night,” Debera said, wondering if that’s what the subtle message was.

“Heavens above, child,” said Tisha, big eyes even wider in her round face, “why, that dress was made for you, even if we didn’t know you’d be coming.” Her deep chuckle made her large breasts and belly bounce.

But it’s far too good a dress… Debera began in protest.

Tisha patted Debera’s shoulder again. “And fits you to perfection. I love making new clothes. My passion really, and you’ll see: I’m always working on something.” Pat, pat. “But if I’d no-one in mind when I cut and sewed it last year, I couldn’t have worked better for you if I’d tried. The dress is yours. We all like to have something pretty to wear on Seventh Day.

Do you sew?” she asked, eyeing Debera hopefully.

“No, I’m afraid not,” Debera answered, lowering her eyes for she remembered her mother with work in her hands in the evenings, embroidering or sewing fine seams in Gather clothes. Gisa barely managed to mend rips, and certainly neither of her daughters was learning how to mend or make garments.

“Well, I don’t know what holder women are doing with their young these days. Why, I had a needle in my hand by the time I was three -“, Tisha went on.

The boys’ eyes were glazing over at the turn of the conversation.

“And you’ll learn to sew harness, my fine young friends,” she said, wagging a finger at them. “And boots and jackets, too, if you’ve a mind to design your own flying wear.”

“Huh?” was M’rak’s astonished reaction. “Sewing’s fer women. “

“Not in the Weyr, it isn’t,” Tisha said firmly. “As you’ll see soon enough. It’s all part of being a dragon rider. You’ll learn.”

“Ah, now, here’s the bread, butter and a pot of jam.”

Sure enough, another ample woman, grinning with the pleasure of what she was about to bestow on them, deposited the laden tray on the table.

“That should help, thank you, Allie,” Tisha said as Debera added a murmur of appreciation and S’mon remembered his manners, too. M’rak made no such delay in grabbing up a piece of the steaming bread and cramming it into his mouth.

“Wow! Great!”

“Well, just be sure you don’t lose it, preparing your dragonet’s next meal,” Tisha said and moved off before the astonished bronze rider had absorbed her remark.

“What’d she mean by that?” he asked the others.

Debera grinned. “Hold-bred?”

“Naw, m’family’s weavers,” M’rak said. “From Keroon Hold.”

“We have to cut up what our dragonets eat, though, don’t we?” S’mon asked in a slightly anxious voice.

“From the bodies they got hung up?”

“You mean cut it off the things that wore the meat?” M’rak turned a little pale and swallowed.

“That’s what we mean,” Debera said. “If you like, I’ll do your carving and you can just cut up. Deal?”

“You bet,” M’rak agreed fervently. And gulped again, no longer attacking the rest of the bread that hung limply from his fingers. He put the slice down. “I didn’t know that was part of being a dragon rider too.”

Debera chuckled. “I think we’re all going to find out that being a dragon rider is not just sitting on its neck and going wherever we want to.”

A prophecy she was to learn was all too accurate. She didn’t regret making the bargain with the two youngsters - it was a fair distribution of effort - but it did seem that she spent her next weeks either butchering or feeding or bathing her dragonet with no time for anything else but sleeping. She had dealt with orphaned animals, true, but none the size nor with the appetite capacity of dragonets. Morath seemed to grow overnight, as if instantly transferring what she ate to visible increase - which meant more to scrub, oil AND feed.

“It’s worth it, I keep telling myself,” Sarra murmured one day as she wearily sprawled onto her bed.

“Does it help?” Grasella asked, groaning as she turned on her side.

“Does it matter?” put in Mesla, kicking her boots off.

“All that oil is softening my hands,” Debera remarked in pleased surprise, noticing the phenomenon for the first time.

“And matting my hair something wicked,” said Jule, regarding the end of the fuzzy plait she kept her hair in. “I wonder when I’ll have time to wash it again.”

“If you ask Tisha, she’ll give you the most marvelous massage,” Angie said, stretching on her bed and yawning.

“My leg’s all better.”

She and her Plath had tripped each other up, and she’d pulled all the muscles in her right leg so badly that at first they feared she’d broken a bone in the tumble. Plath had been beside herself with worry until Maranis had pronounced the damage only a bad wrenching. The other girls had helped Angie tend Plath.

All part of being a dragon rider T’dam had said, but he exhibited sympathy in making sure he was at hand to assist her. too. Nothing you won’t grin about later.

Although the room in which Lord Chalkin sat so that the newly-certified Artist Iantine could paint his portrait of the Lord Holder was warmer than any other chamber in Bitra that Iantine had occupied, he sighed softly in weariness. His hand was cramped and he was very tired, though he was careful not to reveal anything to his odious subject. He also had to do a bang-up job of this portrait as fast as possible, or he might not leave this miserable Hold until the spring.

Fortunately this first snow was melting and, if he finished the painting, he’d leave before the paint was dry. And with the marks he’d been promised!

Why he had ever thought himself able to handle any problem that could occur on a commission, he did not know.

Certainly he had been warned: more about not gambling with any Bitrans, to be sure, had he had any marks to wager. But the warnings had been too general. Why hadn’t Ussie told him how many other people had been defrauded by the Bitran Lord Holder? The contract had seemed all right, sounded all right and was as near to a total disaster as made no never mind. Inexperienced and arrogant, that’s what he was.

Too self-assured to listen to the wisdom of the years of experience Master Domaize had tried to get through his thick head.

But Master Domaize had a reputation for letting you deal with your own mistakes - especially the ones unconnected with Art.

“Please, Lord Chalkin, would you hold still just a moment longer? The light is too good to waste,” Iantine said, aware of the twitching muscles in Chalkin’s fat cheeks. The man didn’t have a tic or anything, but he could no more be still in his fancy chair than his children.

Impishly, Iantine wondered if he could paint a twitch - a muscle rictus - but it was hard enough to make Chalkin look good as it was.

The man’s muddy brown, close-set eyes seemed to cross towards the bridge of his rather fleshy, bulbous nose - which Iantine had deftly refined.

Master Domaize had often told his students that one had to be discreet in portraying people, but Iantine had argued the matter: that realism was necessary if the subject wanted a true portrait.

True portraits are never realistic, his master had told him -and the other students in the vast barn of a place where classes were held.

Save realism for landscapes and historical murals, not for portraits.